CORRESPONDENCE. IRELAND'S LOYALTY.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVII, Issue 260, 13 April 1915, Page 3

CORRESPONDENCE.

IRELAND'S LOYALTY.

To the Editor. Sir.— T n a recent issue of your paper I no( : ' 1 a cablegram referring to ilu lack i" recruiting in Ireland, and infer ring tint Ireland is not doing lier slian in helping the Empire in the present crisis. As an Irishman, and a, loyal subject, I strongly resent this slur thai those cablegrams, or I should use the more fitting term, "cable crammers," are casting on my country and fellow countrymen. Ireland is contributing her share, and more than her share in pro-' portion to her population, of men and money to the Empire which they have helped to build, and will see her through in the present struggle as she has so often done in the past. If all of Britain's subjects are as loyal to her today as the Irish are, then she noed have; no fear of defeat in the present war. Why question her loyalty? Has she n:>t proved her loyalty in the past? Is she not proving her loyalty to the Empire to-day? Yes, as statistics prove, and reliable statistics at that, not the statistics which your recent "cable-crammer" from London or from London's Tory Press quotes. lam pleased to say that I am in a position to deny the reliability of those statistics, and I say they are unmitigated falsehoods. Your cable--gram says there are 442,475 efficient males of recruiting age in Ireland; 51,000 have . enlisted—32,ooo in Ulster and 20,000 in the southern provinces. Now, I will prove to you that these figures are absolutely incorrect, as Mr. Jolm Redmond at a meeting which he addressed in the city of Manchester last month said: "Up to a month ago 00,704 Irishmen in Ireland had enlisted, exclusive of 115,000 Irishmen in Britain." In the House of Lords a short time ago. in reply to an assertion that Ireland was recalcitrant in recruiting, Lord MacDonnell said that Viscount Middleton had stated the recruitment of the whole of Ireland since the outbreak of the war was 54,000. According to Sir< Edward Carson, Ulster had contributed between 16,000 and 17,000. If that were so, the recruitment of the Nationalist part of Ireland was 33,000. In the whole of England, Scotland and Wales 115,000 Irish Nationalists had enlisted since the passing of the Home Rule Bill. "With the figures," said Lord MacDonnell, "0f\38,000 for Nationalist Ireland, over 20,000 with the colors at the beginning of the war, besides special reserves, we have Irishmen joining to the number of over 200,000 men. If an equal response had been made in other parts of the United Kingdom, we should have a force of over 2,000,000." The Marquis of Crewe said Lord MacDonnell's remarkable figures would stand close examination, and added that every single Irish regiment was now at the front in Belgium. The above figures clearly prove that Ireland is playing an important part in this great conflict, as she has done in ot!-:r great wars in which the Empire has been engaged. Ireland has at the time contributed more men, in proportion to her population, than either England, Scotland or Wales. These facts should silence once and for all those evil and prejudiced-minded maligners who are ever ready to east shirs and reproaches on Ireland's loyalty, but, I suppose, we ought not to reprimand or judge them too harshly, as the spirit of intolerance is engendered in them, and perhaps they cannot help that which they inherited. I for one am more than proud of my countrymen for the very noble part they are taking in helping the Empire in this great struggle against the common enemy. And I hope to see my fellowcountrymen mainly instrumental in obtaining for the Empire a complete victory over-her enemies. We Irishmen dcr.ire no praise or glowing tributes for the part we are taking in defence of the Empire, as we consider it our bounden duty to take that part as loyal subjects of our King. However, we do expect justice and fair play. The following verse should be a fitting reply to the too frtquent slurs on Ireland's loyalty: Yes; ready when the call of duty came, For King and Empire Ireland's sons arose, Patriot hearts with loyalty aflame— By sit-li shall Britain overcome her feci'; What men are ye whose libel would) disgrace j The dauntless spirit of a noble race?! Apologising for taking up so much of I j'oui' valuable space,—lam, etc., I

HOME RULER. Lepperton, April 12, 1915.

BASIC CINDER, NOT SLAG. j

To the Editor, j Sir,—Your correspondent J. B. Simpson wants to know how slag is made. Many years ago the ironmasters of England began to leave many millions of tons of low-grade iron ore in the ground because it was so heavily laden with phosphorus, so much so that when iron was made from it, it was not trustworthy. So after a while, two men, Messrs Sidney Thomas and Percy Rilchrist, set themselves the task of seeing if they could make a mild steel out of it by lining the Bessemer converter with limestone as the usual amount of limestone that was put into the blast furnace at the time of the smelting of the ore was not sufficient to absorb the phosphorus. It was the fate or fortune of Thomas H. Gilchrist to discover the way. They got 15 tons, of this lowgrade iron from the blast furnace and charged the Bessemer converter with it, and during the time (a few minutes) the blast engine was driving a strong current of blast up through the molten iron, it was washing (melting) the limestone sides down, and when the carbon was driven off, the iron was converted into liquid steel. Before, however, the steel is poured ofT, the cirnlef is -poured OT] the fl oo r and watered to make it break into small bits so that it can be converted into dust the quicker. —I am etc., H.W.